Chris

I don't think he does - as with many of this country's highly intelligent and articulate atheists, when asked to comment on religious issues he can't help but dissolve into spluttering disapproval.

He, of all people, I should have expected to be able to articulate why he thinks the Pope shouldn't have had a State reception today. Unfortunately when it came to the crunch his argument boiled down to 'he shouldn't get one because it's self evident that the Vatican isn't a State'. Sadly for him and those who think like him, international law doesn't hold that assertion to be self evident.

And I'd be very careful about decrying something due to its status being an 'accident of history' - most of the British constitution is an accident of history, yet I don't hear Stephen Fry demanding a revolution.